Pilot Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic in 1932 – a pioneer in a leather jacket with a revolver in the cockpit.

Newly divorced, Frida Kahlo cut off her hair in 1939 as a symbolic act and painted a portrait of herself wearing her ex-husband’s suit.

Simone de Beauvoir, philosopher and feminist icon, shaped a new understanding of womanhood in 1949 when she wrote “One is not born a woman, but becomes one”.

Actor Tilda Swinton challenges gender role boundaries with her radical androgynous style.

Pamela Anderson, once the poster girl for performative femininity, began appearing without make-up in 2024 – and in doing so, is defying the beauty dogma of her own past.